Stray Sparks

Midnight Monthlies

My darkest thoughts fuel this midnight fire

Call me when you’ve made up your mind

I’ve developed a taste for Earl Grey tea with cardamom and loads of sugar. Go Somali or go home. My tongue is getting blisters. The truth can’t be guzzled, just like this hot tea.

So.

Men are hazy nowadays. Like a thin fog that has you squinting to ascertain whether it’s really fog or if your vision is a tad blurry. They say that they are commitment-averse. They say, don’t be clingy, relax, wait around. Don’t scare him off. The fuck? I want a man who’s strong enough to stomach the truth, resilient enough to stand in his own resolutions come hell or high water, empathetic enough to meet conflict with understanding. I don’t want a scaredy cat that blames his issues on people. That’s a spineless wuss.

Which is why I’ll stay single for a very long time.

But that’s the thing; why do people give condolences to someone for their singlehood? Are people so miserable in their relationships and marriages that they find the very idea of being on their own too terrifying to even contemplate? Don’t people see that they’ll forever be single in their minds? Do people think a relationship is a portal that absolves one of worries and anxieties once walked through? It’s such persistent fantasies that break relationships because one can’t see one’s spouse as they are because of the insistence of living up to an idealistic image far removed from the realm of human nature. If a relationship is the holy grail of human condition, then why do people grow apart, get divorced, end up hating one another?
You’ll always be left with who you are. And if you loathe your own company, why would someone else thrive in it?

So. Unless I can have a crazy passionate love where I can explore the absolute depth and breadth of my – and his– emotions, no matter how painful or uncomfortable, then spare me the headache. Spare me every inauthentic fella who thinks vulnerability is weakness, whilst he pisses himself at the mere mention of love, and can’t assert his true self for shit.

It doesn’t interest me what you do for a living. I want to know what you ache for, and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart’s longing.It doesn’t interest me how old you are. I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, for your dream, for the adventure of being alive. It doesn’t interest me what planets are squaring your moon. I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life’s betrayals or have become shriveled and closed from fear of further pain!I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it or fade it, or fix it. I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own, if you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, to be realistic, to remember the limitations of being human. It doesn’t interest me if the story you are telling me is true. I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself; if you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul; if you can be faithless and therefore trustworthy. I want to know if you can see beauty even when it’s not pretty, every day,and if you can source your own life from its presence. I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine, and still stand on the edge of the lake and shout to the silver of the full moon, “Yes!”It doesn’t interest me to know where you live or how much money you have. I want to know if you can get up, after the night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone, and do what needs to be done to feed the children. It doesn’t interest me who you know or how you came to be here. I want to know if you will stand in the center of the fire with me and not shrink back. It doesn’t interest me where or what or with whom you have studied. I want to know what sustains you, from the inside, when all else falls away. I want to know if you can be alone with yourself and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.